She said: “Seventeen to me is a child. You’re in school. You have no autonomy most of the time. If a schoolteacher is coming onto you, that’s an abuse of power. But I didn’t realize until I was his age.”  

Rina, who admitted to attending sex and relationship therapy in her thirties, said that these experiences influenced the track “Your Age” from her 2022 album, Hold The Girl.  

Listen to “Your Age”, below.

She continued: “I remember distinctly how uncomfortable that made me, but I didn’t put the two and two together. And it was through this very intense form of therapy, which I feel so lucky to be able to have access to, that I was able to come to terms with that, and it completely broke my whole world apart.”  

The singer, who was nominated for best new artist at the 2023 Brit Awards, added that whilst writing the album was one of the most difficult things, the reception has been incredible. She said: “It makes me so happy when I see especially like women or femmes in the audience connecting to it because I haven’t talked about this in specifics. I’ve just said it’s about a period in my life when I was younger, but I know the truth and when I look out to the audience, and I see femmes or women connecting to it, I’m like maybe you know what I’m talking about, maybe you’re feeling it right now.”  

Whilst Rina does not have a direction for her third album, she is ready to close this chapter. “I would love a day where I can just write a song that’s just about love or sex”, the popstar added.  

Hold The Girl is the sophomore album by British popstar Rina Sawayama. The album, which follows up from her self-titled record, includes hits such as “This Hell”, “Catch Me in the Air”, and “Hold The Girl.” The 2022 album achieved great commercial success and debuted at number three on the UK Albums Chart. Across the pond, the record debuted at number 166 on the US Billboard 200.  

The 2022 album received positive responses from critics, in which Hannah Mylrea from NME called it “The best British pop album of the year.”  

Midway through her performance at NOS Alive in Lisbon on Saturday, Sawayama decided to bring up the controversies that have allegedly plagued Healy for months once more. “So I was thinking a lot about apologies,” she began, addressing the audience during the intro to her rage-fuelled single “STFU”. “It’s just funny how some people get away with not apologising ever… For saying some racist shit. For saying some sexist shit.”

This comes a little under a week after Healy’s monologue at Finsbury Park, where he expressed regret over choices he had made in the past, admitting there were some things he wished he could “take back”. 

After thanking the crowd for turning up, Healy had launched into a sincere discourse about past mistakes: “I was always trying stuff. And some stuff I got right and some stuff I got wrong. But, do you know what? There’s a lot of things I’ve said, jokes that I’ve made that I would take back.”

Listen to Healy’s apology below:

The singer has been the subject of much controversy over the years, with the most recent accusations stemming from an appearance on The Adam Friedland Show in February, during which Healy took several ill-advised jabs at fellow musicians and laughed along to offensive jokes made by the hosts.

Sawayama, who is signed to the same label as the problematic frontman, first expressed anger at Healy’s behaviour during her set at Glastonbury, where she took the opportunity to condemn his podcast comments on the big stage: “Tonight, this song goes out to a white man who watches Ghetto Gaggers and mocks Asian people on a podcast. He also owns my masters. I’ve had enough!”

Healy had previously served as director of Dirty Hit Limited, but stepped down in April. His heartfelt speech at Finsbury Park didn’t do much in the way of reconciliation, either, with Sawayama, decidedly unimpressed, calling him out a second time. 

“Why don’t you apologise for once in your life without making it about your fucking self?”, the singer demanded to know, alluding to the latter half of The 1975 frontman’s apology in London.

As well as admitting regret over past actions, Healy had offered an explanation for his inclination towards making controversial remarks: “I really am only doing this because I want to make you guys laugh and feel good. That’s what my favourite art does and that’s what I’m trying to do. I get a bit excited.”

Watch Rina Sawayama call out Matty Healy a second time below:

Rina Sawayama calls out Matty Healy for the second time at NOS Alive Lisbon pic.twitter.com/7ObbLaNMTt

— lou(@l0ul0uthef00l) July 10, 2023

He made it to the Pyramid Stage at 9pm and opened his set with “Pinball Wizard”. After that, he said to the crowd: “I never thought I would ever play Glastonbury and here I am. It’s a very special and emotional night for me because it might be my last show ever in England, so I had better play well and I had better entertain you, you’ve been standing there so long and I really appreciate all the outfits and everything.”

Sir Elton performed a few more songs including “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road” and “I Guess That’s Why They Call It The Blues”. Performing onstage with Elton John was Jacob Lusk of Gabriels and The London Community Gospel Choir for “ Are You Ready For Love?”

While introducing his second special guest, he told the crowd: “When I chose my guests for this show I wanted to have newer artists, save for one person, and this boy I heard last year on the radio. I’ve asked him to come to Glastonbury to do his song and he’s an amazing young talent.” Stephen Sanchez joined Sir Elton onstage and performed Sanchez’s hit song “Until I Found You”.

The next performer that joined Sir Elton John was Brandon Flowers who is The Killers’ frontman. Together they performed “Tiny Dancer”. Afterwards, he welcomed his last special guest Rina Sawayama to the stage and performed “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart” together.

Sir Elton paid tribute to singer-songwriter George Michael with song “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me.” He told the crowd: “He was my friend, he was an inspiration, and today would have been his 60th birthday, so I want to dedicate this song to his memory.”

In an emotional farewell, Sir Elton thanked the crowd, saying: “I also want to thank you for 52 years of amazing love and loyalty that you’ve shown me. It’s been an incredible journey. I’ve had the best time, I will never forget you, you’re in my head and my heart and my soul, you’ve been amazing. You’ve been an incredible crowd tonight. I wish you love and health and happiness.”

“I wrote this next song because I was sick and tired of microaggressions. So, tonight, this song goes out to a white man who watches Ghetto Gaggers and mocks Asian people on a podcast. He also owns my masters. I’ve had enough,” she said to the Glastonbury audience. Despite not mentioning his name, Sawayama was referring to Matty Healy as the “white man” in her speech.

Watch Rina Sawayama calling out Matty Healy at Glastonbury Festival below:

Rina Sawayama calling out Matty Healy at Glastonbury. pic.twitter.com/cBE5rWWtFt

— Pop Base (@PopBase) June 24, 2023

On an episode of The Adam Friedland Show, Healy admitted to watching a pornography series in which black women are “brutalised” and degraded by white men. He also joined in with mocking the US rapper Ice Spice which they made racist jokes regarding her heritage. The hosts referred to the rapper as an “Inuit Spice Girl” and “This chubby Chinese lady”. They then proceeded to mock Japanese, Chinese, and Hawaiian accents while Healy laughed. The offensive episode has since been removed from Apple and Spotify.

Both musicians, Rina Sawayama and Matty Healy’s band The 1975, are signed under same label, Dirty Hit, which is a British independent record label. The 1975 was one of the first acts to be signed on to the label and achieved mainstream success. Since then, other artists under this label include beabadoobe, No Rome, and Pale Waves.

Healy served as director of Dirty Hit Limited, the private limited company behind the record label Dirty Hit, and held the position for 5 years from December 2018 until his termination on April 4, 2023 for unspecified reasons.

However, Healy made somewhat of an apology to Ice Spice for his derogatory remarks on the Adam Friedland Show podcast. At a concert in New Zealand, he said, “I just feel a bit bad, and I’m kind of a bit sorry if I’ve offended you. Ice Spice, I’m sorry. It’s not because I’m annoyed that me joking got misconstrued. It’s because I don’t want Ice Spice to think I’m a dick. I love you, Ice Spice. I’m so sorry.” 

Watch Matty Healy’s apology to Ice Spice at his band’s concert in New Zealand below:

matty healy apologising to @icespicee_ in auckland/nz: pic.twitter.com/gKrKET6Rd2

— Coup De Main (@coupdemain) April 21, 2023

Rina’s live dates act as support for her sophomore album, Hold The Girl which came out in September last year. Last week she shared her latest single from her album, “Eye For An Eye” from the John Wick: Chapter 4 soundtrack.

There are special guests that will accompany her on her four-month tour and those guests are Magdalena Bay, Empress Of, and Tom Rasmussen. Those headlining shows will have Sawayama’s packed festival circuit finally filled out. The festival circuit will also include appearances at Governors Ball, Bonnaroo Osehaga, Lollapalooza, and Life Is Beautiful.

As Rina will be one of the performers at Lollapalooza, there will be a lot of Asian artists that will perform on that day, namely: TXT, NewJeans, Beabadoobe, NIKI, The Rose and DPR Ian, among others. K-pop girl group, Aespa will also be performing at the Governors Ball Music Festival.

HOLD THE GIRL RELOADED TOUR
sign-up for a special pixel pre-sale now !!https://t.co/3yKfD7Gzg2 pic.twitter.com/yEXTICnN7b

— RINA SLAYWAYAMA (@rinasawayama) March 28, 2023

Pre-sale for tickets starts on Wednesday 29 March at 10 am local time and general tickets go out on sale on Friday 31 March. Tickets will be available here.

Rina recently made her acting debut in John Wick: Chapter 4 as Akira. She spoke to NME for the Big Red cover story last year about her role as Akira: “My team are all just shook by the idea that we even got offered John Wick, so I think… none of us really know what’s going to happen. We’re just like, ‘What does happen to people in movies?'”

In a four-star review, of the film, NME wrote: “Chapter 4 doesn’t exude the wheel-spinning cynicism for a forever franchise. Stahelski may traffic in excess, but at least he understands it: how choreography, performance and style can make over-the-top spectacle cohere into pleasurably overwhelming action fizz, rather than congealing into a sweaty special effects overload. He also gets that after 169 minutes, some degree of closure is appreciated. There may well be a John Wick: Chapter 5, but Chapter 4 still feels like a movie giving its all.”

Rina spoke to Sky News about her acting debut, “I actually have been doing self-tapes, when I’ve been sent a really great script and when I’ve got the time, and also when I have the energy because I hate doing them,” she says. “But I’ve been doing them for several years, and I’ve gotten quite close to getting several roles but I hadn’t landed anything.”

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The “Tiny Dancer” singer has announced that he will be joined by recent collaborator Rina Sawayama, the musical partnership was birthed from an already established friendship and resulted in the release of the track “Chosen Family”. The talent pair’s duet was released last year and is a reworked version of an original track written by Sawayama, the single was initially released in 2020 and appeared on the singer’s debut album.

Sir John has become known for more than a large collection of hits and accolades, the singer has been a long-time supporter of new and emerging artists. This dedication to up and coming music can be seen within the concert’s supporting acts, the day’s lineup has been handpicked and curated by Sir John himself. Scheduled to join the Grammy award winning artist are a list of special guests including Gabriels, Let’s Eat Grandma, Berwyn, Thomas Headon, Tom A Smith and Juanita Euka.

CEO of European Festivals at AEG presents, Jim King has given the following statement concerning Sir John’s upcoming performance, “American Express presents BST Hyde Park has always stood for the world’s biggest and most loved artists bringing not just a performance but a truly one-off and memorable event.”

King continues to describe the importance of Sir John’s music, “Elton John has provided the soundtrack to the lives of so many of us and to know that his last tour is coming to Hyde Park, possibly the last time many of us will ever see him play, is one of the most important and ‘must see’ nights of BST Hyde Park ever.”

Also set to appear at this year’s summer concert series are fellow British legends The Rolling Stones, the “Paint It Black” hitmakers will take to Hyde Park on Saturday 25th June 2022 and Sunday 3rd July 2022. American rockers Eagles are scheduled to perform a headlining set on Sunday 26th June 2022, the performance will also mark half a century of the “Hotel California” rockers musical career. Scheduled to provide support are Robert Plant & Alison Krauss, Little Bog town, Cam, Morgan Wade, The Wandering Hearts and Patrick Droney with more acts yet to be confirmed.

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A post shared by BST Hyde Park (@bsthydepark)

Music fans will also be treated to a two-day residency from Grammy award winning singer Adele, the “Easy On Me” singer will perform on 1st and 2nd July 2022. The forthcoming sets will be the singer’s first UK live show in over five years, Adele last took to a UK stage in 2017. Grunge pioneers Pearl Jam will also perform two dates, the group will perform on Friday 8th and Saturday 9th July 2022.

On Friday, the “Even Flow” performers will be joined by fellow 90’s icons Pixies, the first day of their residency will also feature Cat Power, White Reaper, The Murder Capital, The Glorious Sons, Simon Townshend, La Luz, Sick Joy and Dream Nails. La Lux will also join the band during their second and last set, the group will also be supported by British rockers Stereophonics, Imelda May, The Last Internationale, Wilde and The Wild Things.

This year’s BST Hyde Park concert series will be closed by Duran Duran, the “Rio” performers will appear at Hyde Park on Sunday 10th July 2022, marking the group’s debut appearance at the London event. The re-scheduled event will also see the group joined by Nile Rodgers & CHIC, the set will be the group’s first Hyde Park appearance in over six years. The disco legends last appeared at the Hyde Park event in 2015, the band performed on the Great Oak Stage along with Kylie Minogue and Grace Jones.

Click here to purchase tickets.

Hold The Girl
The new album
September 2 2022https://t.co/1r1X9PKSmk pic.twitter.com/nw59Im5ra4

— RINA SAWAYAMA (@rinasawayama) May 16, 2022

The announcement shouldn’t come as a shock to any die-hard Sawayama fans. Last week she blew up her own socials by sharing banners and leaflets with the phrase “Rina Is Going To Hell”. Before taking the now popular move of wiping her Instagram completely to begin a new era for herself. The posts have stayed up on her Twitter though, and attached to a few of the posts you can find what appears to be a mailing list. I don’t actually know anything about what applying to this list will do if anything interesting, but if you’re a fan… it can’t hurt to get involved.

In another good step in the right direction, Sawayama is also set to head overseas tomorrow for an appearance on “Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon”. Say what you will about these American talk shows, but love them or hate them, the amount of genuinely great artists that have had a decent chance in the spotlight through shows like this is really quite pleasing to me. Rina Sawayama is hardly a household name here – which is a massive shame – but given the chance to get a step into the states… what a day. While you may not actually be able to access the show in the UK, clips of Sawayama’s performance will undoubtedly make it online in the next few days.

Anticipations are high for this new project, her debut was an absolute mystery to behold, and pretty much all of the singles released outside of the album have held up pretty well. Hell, even her appearance on that rubbish Elton John collaboration album was pretty good. Rina Sawayama and Dua Lipa were literally the only ones worth listening to. Hear it below.

Your final #BigWeekend Sunday headliner is @Harry_Styles

This is going to be SO special. A full solo festival set

Head here for everything you need to know: https://t.co/4t4HBZtjzI pic.twitter.com/MZxZvfUfc1

— BBC Radio 1 (@BBCR1) April 25, 2022

The annual three-day concert series has become BBC Radio 1’s flagship music event and is set to return to a traditional live format this year. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2019 and 2020 festivals were presented online. The music event will make its comeback on 27th-29th May 2022 at War Memorial Park, BBC Radio 1’s Big Weekend will see 80,000 music fans flock to Coventry to see some of music’s biggest acts perform.

Some of the network’s most played artists will join Styles as headlining acts. Set to take the main stage on Saturday 28th May 2022 are Calvin Harris, Ed Sheeran, Aitch, AJ Tracey, Anne-Marie, Central Cee, Joel Corry and Yungblud. Full details confirming all headlining acts will soon to be confirmed, and Friday’s main stage acts have yet to be announced.

The festival has become known for showcasing both new and established acts across many stages; this year the event will consist of the Main Stage, Future Sounds Stage, Radio 1 Dance Stage and BBC Music Introducing Stage. The Future Sounds Stage is a new addition to the event and will play host to both commercially successful and emerging artists.

Billed to perform at the Future Sounds Stage on the Sunday are Foals, Alfie Templeman, Griff, Holly Humberstone, Joy Crookes, Koffee, Rina Sawayama and Wet Leg. Sawaymama has spoken about her upcoming performance, “I cannot WAIT to come and play at Radio 1’s Big Weekend for the first time!! It’s going to be such a moment.” On Saturday 28th May 2022 the Future Sounds Stage will be home to Sam Fender, Easy Life, Fontaines D.C., KSI, Mimi Webb, Pa Salieu, Sigrid and Tom Grennan. Salieu has also spoken on his forthcoming appearance, “Excited to be finally performing in my home town Coventry as part of Radio 1’s Big Weekend. I know the Coventry crowd will do our city proud and show all the other artists the energy of the Midlands.”

General tickets are selling out fast for the event but a small amount were held back; these tickets were made available to purchase today. Tickets were made available via three tiers, 60% of entry tickets were allocated for Coventry City Council residents. 2% were then allocated for those living in the remaining Coventry, Birmingham and Leicester postcodes, and the remaining 15% were then made available for the rest of the UK to purchase.

Full coverage and highlights of the event will be aired on BBC Radio 1 throughout Friday, Saturday and Sunday. The broadcasts will be available to watch live and on-demand via the BBC iplayer and BBC Sounds.

Click here for more ticket information.

‘Baby’ is a tale of possession and self-assuredness, perfectly summarizing the thought and attitude of the record. The video comes in to illustrate Charli’s desires with an incredible routine, choreographed by Charli’s close collaborator Nathan Kim. Of the song Charli confesses, “The track is about great sex.”. ‘Baby’ debuted on Zane Lowe’s New Music Daily show yesterday, with its debut performance slated to be on SNL this week. This appearance comes 3 months after the star was supposed to appear, but was forced to cancel due to a lack of crew as a result of COVID-19.

Charli’s highly-anticipated forthcoming album, CRASH, will be released on 18th March and is the fifth and final album in her record deal, pre-order information can be found here. Charli kicks off her 21-date North American tour in Los Angeles on 26th March followed by her 17-date UK and European tour which starts in Dublin on 13th May with support from Baby Tate, ELIO, Yeule, Magdalena and A. G. Cook. See full tour dates here.

Another song we know to have made its way onto the album is her recent collaboration with up-and-coming electro-pop superstar Rina Sawayama. In a statement released about the single, Charli had this to say about the track’s meaning, “[it] encapsulates cult theology within popular culture; worship of an image, obsession of a higher power, ritualistic and superstitious practices and the sacrifice for perfection.” The video, filmed in Lancaster, California, the video was directed by Nick Harwood in the same place that the iconic final scene of Se7en was filmed, featuring Brad Pitt having an unfortunate encounter with a box. The press release describes symbolism relating to the cult of celebrities and superstition.

Charli also took to Twitter recently to address some of the poor reception that the new tracks received online. At one point a fan called her ‘mother’, and Charli responded “If u wanna throw around midlife crisis fucking throw it at me. I’m getting older, I’m getting hotter, my tits are stunning, I’m in great shape, I’m dancing, I’m progressing and I’m living my best life – and that the tea.”

OH and finally if u wanna throw around midlife crisis fucking throw it at me – I’m getting older, I’m getting hotter, my tits are stunning, I’m in great shape, I’m dancing, I’m progressing and I’m living my best life – and that the tea

— Charli (@charli_xcx) March 1, 2022

See below Charli XCX’s full UK tour dates:

13/05/2022 – Olympia Theatre – Dublin
5/05 – O2 Academy – Glasgow
17/05 – Victoria Warehouse – Manchester
18/05 – O2 Academy – Birmingham
19/05 – Alexandra Palace – London
21/05 – UEA – Norwich
22/05 – O2 Academy – Sheffield
23/05 – Rock City – Nottingham

Filmed in Lancaster, California, the video was directed by Nick Harwood in the same place that the iconic final scene of Se7en was filmed, featuring Brad Pitt having an unfortunate encounter with a box. The press release describes symbolism relating to the cult of celebrities and superstition, saying that it “encapsulates cult theology within popular culture; worship of an image, obsession of a higher power, ritualistic and superstitious practices and the sacrifice for perfection.“

The track features production credits from Digital Farm Animals and uses a sample from September’s “Cry For You“. If you want to stream the track, you can look here.

It’s only the latest single from Charli’s upcoming album, Crash, which is set to be released on March 18^th. Previous singles include “Good Ones“ from last September, as well as the song “New Shapes“, which showed her taste for collaborations had not fully run its course with Sawayama. Working with Caroline Polacheck and Christine and the Queens, they almost got to feature on the popular American sketch show Saturday Night Live last December. Sadly the pandemic scuppered these intentions, but you can still listen to the track below.

As for her latest track, Charli has a lot of good things to say about it. Built from a demo given her by her record company, she says the track touches on a number of things very personal to her. “To me, “Beg For You” is the most perfectly constructed pop song. Not just because of its musicality, but because of its circumstance. Two arguably left-of-center pop stars, one of them a member of the queer community and one an ally of the queer community, coming together on a track that’s paying homage to an iconic and nostalgic queer anthem via the use of an interpolation…it couldn’t be more perfect!”

If you want to read more about the making of the video, you can look at this article here. Otherwise, news of a tour should put you in good spirits, with Charli coming to both North America and the UK/Europe over the coming months. Tickets can be purchased here and the UK tour dates can be seen below.

Charli XCX UK Tour Dates:

13/05/2022 – Olympia Theatre – Dublin
15/05 – O2 Academy – Glasgow
17/05 – Victoria Warehouse – Manchester
18/05 – O2 Academy – Birmingham
19/05 – Alexandra Palace – London
21/05 – UEA – Norwich
22/05 – O2 Academy – Sheffield
23/05 – Rock City – Nottingham